Crappy Rios

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wrassehole

wannabe reefmaster
Joined
Jul 17, 2004
Messages
201
Location
Capital of Canada
i recently bought 4 Rio pumps thinking they were good pumps, it wasnt until i was introduced to this site and read your threads, all of a sudden, i hate my pumps. is there anything I can do from having my pumps poison my aquarium? change the impellor once in a while, get rid of them completely. if you were me, what would you do, keping in mind i spend about a weeks pay on these bad boys. cant havem on timers because you have to suplex them to start working.

thanks reefers :exclaim:
 
You said it yourself...........Can't trust them to restart. I would return them if at all possible. Rio's are just an accident waiting to happen. Check out Mag-Drive.
Scott
 
Ahhhh...Get rid of them or at least relegate them to salt mixing duties in a trash can, pumping water at water change time. Use them 24/7 in your tank....and they are an accident waiting for a place to happen, and it will happen, ie...burn up fail to pump and cause a flood as a result, have a "nuclear melt down" and nuke your tank for you as well as short out on you and electricute you or your tanks inhabitants (been there done that one! What an enlightening experience...nothing quiet as special as water and electricity. Its kinda like Rednecks + Alcohol + Guns ='s something really bad gonna happen :lol: ). They are cheap inexpensive power heads, and they are pretty good at working, but lack the quality needed for reliability and safety.

I know... there is someone out there thats going to get sensitive on me cause they have one and its been great for the last 10 years. Every dog eventually has a lucky day. The odds are way against that happening, Its much like roulette! The question is...Do you feel lucky?

I swapped all of mine out over a few months with Mag Drives or Maxi Jets. I am not going to say that they are the best or that they cant fail, but they will beat a Rio 8 days a week! Not that, that is hard to do when talking about Rio's. What really freaks me out is that many pumps used on several models of skimmers are Rio's! I mean, what was the manufactures thinking? Oh yeah, thats right, they werent!

Seriously though, get some piece of mind, and ditch the Rios for some better pumps as "fun dollars" permit. I promise you wont regret it. Do like me and let it be a learning lesson and do some research before you buy next time. The best mistakes to learn from are the ones someone else made, cause you dont have to feel the pain...too :D !

HTH's
 
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Well it would depend on what model rios your talking about. The larger ones are as everyone has sated, pure junk but the smaller rios like the rio 600's and smaller work just fine.
 
Ritsuko Nashida said:
Its kinda like Rednecks + Alcohol + Guns ='s something really bad gonna happen :lol: ).
I'm from the state of Misery. I don't git what yur talkin' bout.

BTW....do you know the famous last words of a redneck? "Hey ya'll... Watch this!"
 
Curtswearing said:
I'm from the state of Misery. I don't git what yur talkin' bout.

BTW....do you know the famous last words of a redneck? "Hey ya'll... Watch this!"
The words "Hold my beer!" are usually in there somewhere too :D
 
"Hey ya'll...watch this!" and "Here hold my beer" was exactly what I was getting at! I went to College down in the South for a couple of years and recall those phrases more times than I would like to remember...you just know there is about to be some excitement! :lol:

Hopefully no one took that personal...
 
get a mag pump. far less likely to fail on you.
you just can't trust the hermetic seals on the rios.
i don't know what rio's malfunction is, you would think that after
all the bad press they get in these forums, a light bulb would appear
over their heads and something would change.
oh well,
mag drive
 
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Actually, I think Rio has introduced a completely new line of pumps. I cant remember the "series name" and I havent seen many of them for sale, and I am not talking about the "Hyper-Flow" series...

Still doesnt change the fact that I dont trust them further than I can throw them! You right, one would have to think that Rio would have jumped on this problem! I think though that since they target the buget end of the scale and sell a lot, especially to newbies that they werent too concerned and the bad press/rep wasnt affecting sales too much.
 
Has anyone actually had a problem with the rio 600's and below??

I agree the bigger rios are junk(2100 etc) but the smaller ones arent too shabby.
 
I had several 400's, 600's and 800's die on me but none never nuked my tank. The one that zapped me was a Rio 1100. Sure wished I would have known about these forums when I first got started...The things I would do over again............
 
Maxi Jets, I love them, they run, & run & run.......................................................................................
 
I'm not a big fan of rio's myself but I think every proplem I have with them it was my fault. Running them dry or something. But I really happy with my maxi jets. I have done everything to them and they still run. But that is just my thought!
 
I'll be the "other guy" who can say he's been happy with about 8 RIO pumps (2100,2500, 3100) over the last 10-15 years.

Sure I've had some chatter on me, and even a tickle shock, but I've had other equipment do the very same thing for failures.

Yup I've heard about the melt downs, glowing nuclear oil oozing from them and total tank wipe out worse than the Exxon Valdize.........

BUT, for those of you who fear for your women and childrens household safety, I will gladly take your RIO pumps off your hands in order to make the world a better place.

Send me your pumps - hurry, one is lurking behind your leetle girl right now!

:lol:
 
i fear for the pump that attacks my lil girl,,,shes just like her dad,,,tough and aint skeered of nothing,,,('cept spiders),,lol

as for Rios, i have had a few that were just stubborn to restart,,,then i had one meltdown in my sump. its scary to see black smoke and a horrific smell coming from your sump. it stunk up the house and actually started to melt the housing,,,it looked like molten lava that hit the ocean! i have a small rio still sitting around,,but im keeping it,,,never know when i need a rock to throw at someone :D
 
i just replaced al my 2100 rios with JBJ's, and they were like 10 bucks cheaper. they are freakin powerful, i bet they can suck start a harley. they have dual outputs too, wha hoo i lovem
 

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